


The Sliding Scale of Affection

by factorielle



Series: I You He [2]
Category: Ookiku Furikabutte
Genre: Fuckbuddies, M/M, Post-Coital, Prequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-07
Updated: 2010-08-07
Packaged: 2017-10-10 23:45:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/105766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/factorielle/pseuds/factorielle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You know, you could make a pretty decent sex friend if you weren't so... you." [Prequel to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/104731">I You He</a>.]</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Sliding Scale of Affection

It's the socks first today, left first, then right. It might seem random, the first items of clothing that fall under his hand after the towel drops to the ground, but there's a pattern.

"You know that every time you get dressed after taking a shower you always put your socks on first?" Hamada says conversationally, spreading over the whole width of the futon. It's still warm, even on top of the blanket. "I wonder if that means something."

Izumi stops in the middle of hunting for his shirt. "Spare me the pop psychology. I get enough of that at home."

Another pattern: whatever the topic is, he can bring the conversation back to his roommate in under three sentences, without ever noticing he's doing it. "From your wife?" Hamada asks, not so innocently.

"You know..." he sits on the futon, still only half-dressed. "You could make a pretty decent sex friend if you weren't so... you."

Really, now? "It's not like you to come back over and over for something that's not even decent."

Obviously, though, that's nowhere near enough to win one over Izumi. "Charity," he answers with a slight shrug. "You and I both know that if it weren't for me you'd never get laid."

There are some slurs Hamada will take, and a couple more he'll take only from Izumi. Not this, though. He sits up, grabs him by the shoulders, pushes down. Izumi attempts to struggle, but he's still shorter, still smaller, and got caught by surprise: it's not even half a minute before Hamada has him pinned to the mattress.

There's nothing sweet about kissing him. There never is: it's tongue and teeth, Izumi's reminder that he's still in charge no matter what he allows anyone to do to him. And he gives as good as he gets, every time.

"How about you stay here for the night and I show you just how indecent I can get?" Hamada asks when the kiss breaks and they're already breathing slightly deeper than normal.

"Tempting." Izumi's smile is genuine, a little dazed. It's always gratifying to get him like this. "But I should go back. Mizutani broke up with his girlfriend, I got the email earlier."

Hamada lets himself be pushed off. "What happened, he find out she's a skank?"

"Probably." He frowns. "How do you even know that? I never said anything about her."

Her in particular, no. "Just an educated guess, based on your descriptions of his previous girlfriends." Including the one whose best friend Izumi dated back in high school.

He gets a glare from that, but it lacks heat. "If you're looking for meaning in that, find it in the fact that he never figured out the balance between great but unattainable and willing but loose."

And where does Izumi himself rank on that scale, when after all this time Hamada still doesn't know if he's denying it out of habit or because he seriously refuses to admit it? "So you're going to comfort him, then? Share a blanket and junk food in front of a movie, offer a shoulder to cry on, tell him that girl was never good for him anyway?"

Izumi slips his sweater on, pulls his hair out in a practiced move. "As _friends_ do, yes."

"Right."

"Do we really need to have this conversation again?" They don't, but whenever the topic comes up Izumi will roll his eyes, grumble, but never say anything like 'never mention this again or I'll tell your girlfriend that the reason you don't ask her to blow you is that I do it better'. "Yes, I like him. He's my friend. Yes, I'm attracted to him, and I wouldn't skip on a chance to perform some truly depraved acts on his person. Doesn't mean I want to adopt him into the family and have babies with him."

"Depraved, huh?"

He smirks, a little deprecatingly. "Just give me a free week-end and some energy drinks. And then I'd be over it. Only it's never going to happen, and I'm perfectly fine with that."

So fine with it that Hamada sometimes wonders if he shouldn't just let it rest, but he's the one who has to endure the endless stories about what Mizutani had for breakfast and how he always waits until the last minute to do his homework. He's owed this bit of entertainment. "Because you don't sleep with your friends, right?"

Izumi laughs at that, and comes back to sit on the bed, fully dressed and ready to go. "Ah, I see what you've been getting at now." He takes a deep breath and schools his face into an earnest expression. "I don't usually sleep with my friends, no." He makes a show of brushing a strand of hair away from Hamada's face, looking straight into his eyes. "You're just... special."

"Brat."

Izumi springs to his feet, neatly dodging the smack aimed at his head. "I should go." He looks tired, but smiling, and certainly more relaxed than when he walked in.

"Can you toss me my phone?" He could get up and retrieve it from his discarded pants himself, but right now the bed is a nicer place to be. Sex with Izumi is a lot of things, many of them superlatives, but restful it is not. "Have a safe trip back."

He waits until the door's closed to grab his phone. He gets to an exuberant voicemail message and almost hangs up. But Izumi's special to others, too, and in more ways than he knows.

"I've thought it over. I'm in, if you can convince him."


End file.
